


Pain of love

by DoraTLG



Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: Bond is terrible with men, First Kiss, Flirting, M/M, Q is lame and has the worst self esteem, demisexual Q, it's a bit angsty I guess because Q is in emotional pain a lot, so maybe hurt/comfort, well when I say flirting...
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-15
Updated: 2015-01-15
Packaged: 2018-03-07 15:18:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3176695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoraTLG/pseuds/DoraTLG
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Q is a demisexual. He would be fine if he wasn't also a desperate romantic. Years alone made him very aware of everything that wasn't perfect on him, making him a sad pile of binary code. When he falls in love again, it's not one of those beautiful feelings of longing and hope. It is a hard, crushing pain of despair. Where is the chance that when he finally loves again, the other one could love him back?</p><p>"His heart ached. One side of him hated those romantic words about butterflies and “can't think can't sleep can't eat” shit, but the other lived it. He didn't believe in forbidden love and soul mates, but he wanted it desperately."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pain of love

**Author's Note:**

> Many things here are just me spitting out what I felt throughout my life. This is why I believe I am a demisexual. Anyone wanting to express his point of view, I would love to read it in the comments, because I don't really know about demisexuality more than what the definition says. So maybe I'm wrong. Who knows. Anyway, enjoy.
> 
> PS: I swear I'm gonna name my stories after Taylor Swift's lyrics from now on, because this just gets ridiculous.

Everyone dreams of love.

Well, not everyone. There are people that don't care about lovers and cuddling and breakfast in bed and kisses and life in two and all the stuff Q always wanted. Some people are disgusted by the image. But Q never could be.

It started when he was a teenager. One day his new hobby – computer – crashed and he was left with his old hobby – books – to entertain him on a rainy day. He skimmed through his favourite books and found out that his tastes had changed. He was no longer interested in dragons and knights, the stories were just not fascinating anymore. He didn't feel the need to read, that need that kept him up as a kid, pretending to sleep but instead hiding a book under his covers and illuminating it with the display of his old Nokia 3310. His mother was sure that these hours of rebelling destroyed his sight. He just shrugged and never paid much attention to preventing his already bad sight to go even worse.

This boring day he went to his mother's cabinet and picked up a book. It was one of the fifty she had at home, with a beautiful, half naked woman in the arms of a handsome, muscular man. He never looked twice at such thing, but now it was tempting – it had just something over a hundred pages and he was a curious kid. So Q was twelve when he's read his first romantic story and he fell in love.

He never told anyone about this new found fascination. He kept reading until he knew every book, and then he started to look for them on the internet. He found out that he liked stories with more complicated plots and characters, and tried classics as Jane Eyre. He started daydreaming and every night before bed he would see himself with a girl or a man. That was also the time he figured that he might be bisexual.

He went around it a bit differently than people usually do. He asked his mother.

“Mum?” he said when they were watching the tele one evening. His father was out with friends.

“Yes, honey?” she asked absentmindedly. 

“I'm a bit confused about something,” he tried.

“What, darling?” his mother asked after he didn't continue. She muted the TV.

“I… I think I like… I mean… well, you know how men like women, right? I, uh…”

His mother got THAT expression – that one people get when they know what is going to happen and they already know that it is absolutely alright and they have to comfort you before you start to think otherwise…

“And you like boys, oh, honey, that is absolutely alright…!”

“No, no, mum,” he stopped her with a little twist of lips. “That's the thing. I know people are straight and gay. But I feel like I like BOTH women and men. Is that normal?”

“Oh. Oh! Yes, yes, absolutely, that is called bisexuality, sweetie. It is absolutely normal. Absolutely.”

Q blamed her for his excessive usage of the word “absolutely”.

One would say his life was so easy when he was a boy wanting romance with so many people to choose from.

It was not.

He fell in love when he was thirteen. The girl wasn't very pretty, but she was highly intelligent, charismatic and funny. He was at a new school and his new schoolmates told him about her, and he was intrigued, and the moment he saw her he fell for her.

He never acted on it. He was scared that she would notice and laugh at him, because he was lame and wore glasses, so he tried not to even look at her, not knowing how long does normally person look at another person if they are NOT obsessed with them.

She left at another school after a year and he kept loving her for another year. He remembered two years of suffering and butterflies in his stomach every time he saw her. He told her he loved her later, after years, and she said she suspected it. That was all.

And then he didn't love for another six years.

He spent that time wishing for anyone that would pick his interest. He knew the pain he felt while in love was terrible, but he missed the feeling. He felt only numbness without it. He learned about varying sexualities and he was thinking that maybe he could be asexual, but he was very sexual by himself. And he thought about sex with other people all the time. It was just that he never felt the need to sleep with anyone around him. At last, he settled on the knowledge that he was demisexual.

He could never force himself to love someone. His family started to ask about girlfriends when he was fifteen and kept on until he was twenty and finally snapped at them. He lost his virginity to someone who liked him and whom he adored to death. They were together for eleven months until Eric got bored of him.

At his twenty second birthday, he bought himself a cat.

Now he was thirty two, the cat was old and his other cat was a bitch. He had a history of brief encounters he had to force himself into, trying to find that feeling he had when he was in bed with a loved person, but sex was unsatisfying and weird with strangers and even with people he knew and liked. If he loved, he was not loved back, and he never developed any skills in flirting. He was awkward, wore big glasses and cardigans, not really the type for night clubs and he's heard that's where all the fun is.

And he was in love again.

James Bond was standing in front of him with that handsome face, grumpy as always, asking for a favour. And Q, as always, broke all the rules, risked his career, and made all Bond's wishes come true. Because he was stupid like that. And he knew Bond will never reciprocate his feelings, that he was to become as frustrated as always, crying himself to sleep three nights out of seven, and feeling like shit in front of the agent. 007 had his beautiful women. Q had the newest Assassins Creed.

“Everything alright, Q?” Bond asked. Q raised his head in surprise. Bond never asked about him. He was always this self-centred bastard that only took. Q never minded, but it was strange for him to answer after all those months of being ignored.

“Ehm, yeah. Yes, I am fine.”

He wanted to ask why, but suspected to be just brushed off with something like “Just curious” or “You don't look good”. He bloody knew he doesn't look good.

He came back to his work, typing away on his computer, and when he looked up, he found Bond staring at him with those impossible eyes.

“Yes, agent?” he asked, trying to remain his composure. Those eyes were unnerving him. And his eyebrows, the space between them, the root of his nose, so often furrowed, and that strong nose and cropped lips, stubble suited him so beautifully, reaching his neck, and Q wanted to touch that rough skin, wanted to kiss that wrinkle between his eyes…

He realized he's staring when Tanner walked into his workplace – a small shop just outside MI6 – and broke the moment. Because it was actually a moment, he found out, because Bond was doing the same, watching him like a curious lion.

“Is 007 debriefed yet?” Bill asked, walking to Q's desk. He shook his head as if waking from a dream and nodded, not looking at him.

“Yes, he's been informed,” he stopped himself before he could babble something about received tech and new target and other obvious things.

“Bill,” Bond turned and waved the man goodbye. “Q,” he tipped his head Q's direction and left. Bill went shortly after him and Q had finally a moment to himself, when he could take off his glasses and rub his brow, sighing deeply. His heart ached. One side of him hated those romantic words about butterflies and “can't think can't sleep can't eat” shit, but the other lived it. He didn't believe in forbidden love and soul mates, but he wanted it desperately.

 

When Bond came back from the mission, Q was in his lab. He got the message about 007's comeback, but didn't expect it to affect him in any way, since Bond almost never came to him without a direct order. So he stayed in the lab, tinkering with a gun for 009, secretly hoping it would go off in the most inappropriate situation, because the agent was an arsehole. After some minutes, the door opened and his assistant leant into the room.

“Sir, agent 007 is here, should I let him in or…?”

He frowned at her, confused.

“He is here?” he asked like an idiot. She just nodded.

“Ehm… let him in, then,” he said, still frowning. She stepped aside and Bond walked in, looking around before settling his gaze on Q.

“007,” Q said, hoping for an explanation.

“Q,” Bond stopped by his table and looked over the gun. “What is that?”

“A gun for 009,” he said, distracted.

“I hate that guy,” Bond said. Q smirked and nodded, trying to get back to work, but it was almost impossible with Bond just two feet from him.

“Did you want something, agent?” he gave up and looked at him again. Bond looked like he was considering an answer, then shut his mouth and that wrinkle appeared again.

“You never sit down,” he said then, surprising Q and, by the look on his face, even himself. He briefly looked like he bit his own tongue.

“What?” Q put down the tools with an incredulous look. Bond ran a hand through his hair in frustration.

“I don often flirt with guys,” he admitted and Q's eyes widened in shock.

“You were flirting with me?” he asked incredulously and put down the tools to push his glasses higher on his nose. “Even I flirt better than that!”

They laughed. Q was so shocked he almost lost track of what he was saying and only thanked the God he said something as genial in comparison to what usually left his mouth.

“Yeah, well… I don't really have practice. Targets are usually females and I don't really have the time outside of work…”

“Wait,” Q had to stop him. His mind couldn't catch up with the words. “Are you saying you were genuinely trying to… catch my attention? Like…”

“Like Do you want to go out with me?” Bond asked, this time slightly concerned he misread Q. “For a drink? Or did I overstep?”

“No, you… you did not overstep, no,” Q said in awe. “You… I really didn't think that you'd… be interested.”

“Well… I am.”

They stared at each other, both wary. The time stretched between them.

“Bond…” Q started, the years he spent made fun of in school and ignored in later life catching up with him. “If this is a joke, please don't. I mean it. I would fucking make your gun hate you, I mean it, I can do it. Just don't.”

He knew these words could get him fired, but he just didn't care. He had enough of pain in his life. He wasn't prepared for another dose, as much as he grew used to it. He knew it would destroy him from the hands of this man.

“No, no,” Bond shook his head, probably seeing the concern mixed with panic in Q's eyes. “I absolutely mean it. I really like you. Just give me one drink, I'll prove it.”

Q sighed and had to work on his expression, because he felt a strong urge to break into laughter. He wanted to skip the drink – he was really terrible at social interaction – but he knew Bond was THAT kind of guy, so he nodded.

“Give me ten minutes to reassemble this thing for that…” -peace of shit- “other agent and then I'm free for the evening.”

They met fourteen minutes later in the front room and Q told his assistant to rule the kingdom for a while, hoping his presence won't be needed. They silently walked to the nearest Starbucks, ordering cups of steaming Americano, and stayed standing at a tall little table.

“I…” Q started, not knowing what to say. He wanted to ask why, why would Bond want him for a drink, if he needed something, if he understood correctly and the agent actually meant it… romantically. Intimately. But he knew that each such question would just show how terribly desperate he is, how this never happened to him, how he was the last person on Earth Bond would want. So instead he settled for a question that would only expose Bond. “I thought you were straight.”

Bond shrugged.

“I don't really care what I am. I always found sexuality to be fluid. I don't usually fall for guys, almost never, actually, but on the other hand, I don't get emotionally attached to women very often, either. They do attract me sexually and men mostly aesthetically, if even.”

“And I?” Q asked before he could stop himself. Bond looked him in the eyes for several seconds before he answered.

“And you,” he said, his voice a hair lower. “Quartermaster, you somehow managed to steal my interest far more than I would like for anyone to.”

Q's breath hitched. He tried to hide his reactions, but he was sure Bond could see it all – his clenching teeth, needy eyes, tries to remain calm although jumping inside his brain… he was starting to get happy. Joyous, thrilled, ecstatic. His dreams could be coming true if this really isn't a big FUCK YOU from the universe.

“007?” he asked, raising is eyes to his agent's. Bond looked like he had to come back from his own thoughts.

“Hm?” he hummed.

“I hate coffee and crowded places, can we cut it?” Q asked and Bond sighed and rubbed his eyes before circling the table.

“I thought you'd never asked,” he said and kissed Q.


End file.
